GOP congressman and Senate nominee Todd Akin: Rape is an effective form of birth control

Our completely incorrect biology lesson today comes not from Chateau Heartiste or The Spearhead or EvoPsychBullshitBeliever997 on Reddit but from an actual elected official with influence in the real world: Republican Congressman Todd Akin of Missouri, currently his party’s nominee for Senate.

In a recent interview with KTVI-TV, the Fox affiliate in St. Louis, he explained that the ladies just don’t get pregnant from rape — well, “legitimate rape” anyway. As he put it:

From what I understand from doctors, that’s really rare. If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.

But let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work or something. I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be on the rapist and not attacking the child.

As The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake notes, this whole “rape as birth control” thing is not actually, you know, true:

According to a 1996 study, approximately 32,000 pregnancies result from rape annually in the United States, and about 5 percent of rape victims are impregnated.

Talking Points Memo notes that this isn’t the first time Akin has suggested that

some types of rape are more worthy of protections than others. As a state legislator, Akin voted in 1991 for an anti-marital-rape law, but only after questioning whether it might be misused “in a real messy divorce as a tool and a legal weapon to beat up on the husband,” according to … the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Akin: making up shit to deny rape victims their rights since 1991!

Currently, Akin has a big lead in the polls over his Democratic rival, sitting Sen. Claire McCaskill.

Here’s the relevant portion of Akin’s interview; you can find the whole thing at the Talking Points Memo link above.

Oh Varpole: It might be that, because this is actually the right thing, that many people (who might otherwise be in non-agreement) are in consonance.

A single data point doesn’t prove your fantasy land of misandry.

Since the Boehners, the Tony Perkins, the Pat Robertsons, the Rick Santorums, the Mitt Romney’s of the world were prevented from having any say in politics… oh wait!? They weren’t? You mean the things Obama says aren’t the overwhelming majority opinion of people who write laws and make policy?

There’s another reason the Quiverfull churches say marital rape shouldn’t be a crime, besides how they think women should always obey their husbands. They say that the marriage vows themselves give permanent consent. In the case of Quiverfull, the emphasis for the followers is on having as many babies as possible. That’s why not only do they oppose contraception, they are even against natural family planning methods like the rhythm method. They say the rhythm method makes couples have a “birth control mentality”, and they are rebelling against God by controlling the size of their family.*

So if the partners in a marriage are allowed to withhold consent, then they could do that as a way to avoid pregnancy. This is probably more of a temptation for the wife, because pregnancy is so hard on the body. Who could blame a mother of ten if she wants a break from pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding?

*Even though the rhythm method is pretty bad for efficacy, it’s still better than nothing.

And given how conservatives go all batshit nasty about some of the basic theories of postmodernism, I ain’t letting them have the “I said the wrong words” but they aren’t important, it’s what’s in my heart.

No, asshole, it’s what you DO (legislation) and SAY (impact on public discourse), not what is in your heart–unless you want to rip your heart out and show it to us.

Please do! Akin has some super rich campaign contributors and they have ads on TV and the Internet all the time bashing McCaskill. I don’t have any money right now, so I’ve been canvassing for her campaign. If the reactions I get in Barton, Newton, McDonald, and Jasper counties are any indication, she has her work cut out for her.

Even without his terrible statements on “legitimate” rape, Akin is still a terrible person unfit for government service. He wants to privatize Medicare and Social Security, keep Missouri from expanding Medicaid benefits (even though that money comes from the federal government, something we take more from than we give to), abolish the Dept. of Education, cut FEMA spending, and get rid of free and reduced lunches.

I’ll be honest. My child is on the free school lunch program, we have gotten govt. money because of the tornado, and we are already benefiting from the ACA getting rid of copays for preventable diseases. So of course I want to vote for the people that want to keep helping my family. Why the heck is almost everyone else around me getting this same help but voting for Tea Party dipshits like Akin? It boggles the mind.

As long as someone is anti choice and anti marriage equality, they will vote for the very people that want them to go without medical care and make their kids go hungry at school.

Sorry, I went off on a rant, but this kind of stuff frustrates me so bad.

@rahu i want to add my voice to the others; i’m sorry that you went through that.

@nanasha happy and healthy months to you, congrats on your pregnancy and your babby 🙂 i’m jealous, i’m currently undergoing IVF due to broken tubes from stealth endometriosis. i look up to you and your hubsband and hope to follow you soon!!

Far from exposing any sort of “misogyny”, this whole imbroglio seems indicative of a feminist culture- now crucifying the man who went against the grain. In other words, a lone voice is the exception that proves the rule.

yeah dude, someone said a dumb and demeaning thing about women, but the real victim is you and your pwecious widdle baby feelings.

he didn’t say something that ‘went against the grain’ he said something that was clearly scientifically inaccurate and showed a total lack of compassion for victims of rape. are you really this fucking stupid?

Why the heck is almost everyone else around me getting this same help but voting for Tea Party dipshits like Akin?

Several reasons based on conversations I have had with the nutters out here:

1. I am not like those “other people” who are just leeches. I have a real need for it.
2. If it is available I will use it but fight to get rid of it despite it meaning that it is not there for me in the future when something like this happens again.
3. I should get to decide where my hard earned money goes not some “bureaucrat” in DC.
4. Government is wasteful-private charities are the best method of helping others.
5. Abortion Abortion Abortion. Have to save the little babies! That we promptly then ignore. Those damn sluts deserve all that they get.

Far from exposing any sort of “misogyny”, this whole imbroglio seems indicative of a feminist culture- now crucifying the man who went against the grain. In other words, a lone voice is the exception that proves the rule.

It has been the official party platform for decades dimwit. Not a “lone voice” but a voice echoing the mainstream of the Republican Party.

Sorry, I’m probably spamming this thread but I got to share the newest now. Akin has vowed he will stay in the race, come hell or high water. I really hope this means he’ll keep saying stupid, terrible things so McCaskill can win. He’s also losing a lot of his big money sponsors like Tamko and Karl Rove. Some of the right wingers are still backing him up though. This is what the Jasper County Republican coordinator said

John Putnam, chairman of the Jasper County Republican Central Committee and a staunch Akin supporter, defended the comments and said he had been assured by the campaign in a conference call Monday that the GOP candidate would not drop out of the race.

“What he was talking about is forcible rape. There are established studies that show in cases of forcible rape, pregnancy is rare.” Putnam cited an article titled “Rape Pregnancies are Rare,” by John C. Wilke, M.D., from an April 1999 publication called Christian Life Resources.

So instead of looking at all of the real medical science that shows that Akin is wrong, he is relying on anti choice propaganda to back him up. Oh and he’s replaced the phrase “legitimate rape” with “forcible rape”.

Well we all know “forcible rape” is the only rape that counts. /sarcasm

Honestly, part of me wonders if a lot of theses guys say this stupid shit to spare their consciences of having to examine things they or their friends have done that they aren’t proud of. Like that guy friend who’d take the girls who could barely stand from intoxication to his room or the dude who was always just a little too aggressive with the ladies or that one night where, well, she didn’t say no, but she tried to push him away and when he didn’t stop, just stayed still until he was done…

I know, I know, I’m a horrible mean meanie man-hating feminist for daring to imply that rape apologists might be rapists themselves, or know rapists, but I don’t think it’s too far of a stretch to figure that those who most vehemently employ apologist tactics about rape are probably doing so out of some sort of self-interest.

I made a comment on this before, but it disappeared after I hit post comment. Sorry if this ends up being a double post.

They’re talking about Akin’s comment on the Spearhead now. Even W.F. Price thinks Akin is full of shit, although he also agrees with him that women are likely to falsely claim to be raped in order to get abortions. Price then said that because women are such lying liars, abortion should remain legal. Of course the comments are just as bad.

Oh dear lord, how sad is it that Akin is too extreme for even the Spearhead?

I’d think someone would have brought this up somewhere around here at some point but, well… I wanted to link it anyway.
Distance themselves from Akin by equating rape with having a child out of wedlock. Stay classy, GOP !

“Hey, Representative Todd Akin. I have a question for you. If women can’t get pregnant from legitimate rape, then how come there are so many light-skinned black people walking around Alabama?”

Rahu: I don’t think you want to know what he really thinks about that.

I was pretty horrified at first, but I got to thinking about it, and I think it’s just ambiguously worded. I don’t know who this Kamau Bell is, but I think it’s legitimate to ask about white men assaulting black women.

The way it’s worded, of course, the first thing one may think of is black men Taking Our Virginal Daughters.

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